Padraic Colum (1881–1972). Anthology of Irish Verse. 1922.
By Stephen Gwynn57. The Woman of Beare
E
Leaves, where it wantoned before
Wan and naked the shore,
Heavy the clotted weed.
And my heart, woe is me!
Ebbs a wave of the sea.
Foul am I that was fair,
Gold-embroidered smocks I had,
Now in rags am hardly clad.
Staring bone and shrunken skin,
Once were lustrous, once caressed
Chiefs and warriors to their rest.
Splendour of an aged throne,
Wealth I envy not, nor state.
Only women folk I hate.
Shines the sun of living gold
Flowers shall wreathe your necks in May:
For me, every month is grey.
Even out of dead desire.
Wealth, not men, ye love; but when
Life was in us, we loved men.
Of their coursers on the plains;
Wild the chariots rocked, when we
Raced by them for mastery.
Stands in Bregon Ronan’s chair.
And the slow tooth of the sky
Frets the stones where my dead lie.
Through the forest winter stalks;
Not to-day by wood and sea
Comes King Diarmuid here to me.
Through the shivering reeds, across
Fords no mortal strength may breast,
He rows—to how chill a rest!
Every acorn has to fall.
Bright at feasts the candles were,
Dark is here the house of prayer.
Drank with kings the mead and wine,
Drink whey-water now, in rags
Praying among shrivelled hags.
Let me do God’s wil all day—
And, as upon God I call,
Turn my blood to angry gall.
Well the ebb, and well the flow,
And the second ebb, all three—
Have they not come home to me!
Monarchs, mad to be my slaves,
Crested as by foam with bounds
Of wild steeds and leaping hounds.
To my silent dark fireside.
Guests are many in my hall,
But a hand has touched them all.
Now the ocean backward steals:
But to me my ebbing blood
Brings again no forward flood.
Leaves, where it wantoned before,
Changed past knowing the shore,
Lean and lonely and grey.
And far and farther from me
Ebbs the wave of the sea.